The Chopper killer strategy

Ralph Peters:

WITHIN two weeks, four choppers go down in Iraq. Shot down. By ene mies who previously couldn't hit the Goodyear Blimp.

Attack helicopters and transport birds, military and contractor aircraft went down. Crews KIA (in one case, executed). Did the bad guys just get lucky?

No. They have new weapons. And new training. And a new strategy.

First, the strategy: In Iraq, helicopters serve as our taxis, moving personnel quickly and - until now - safely above the carnage on the ground. Attack helicopters provide quick-response fire support to the grunts, giving us a huge advantage.

Limit our freedom to fly, and you not only reduce the ability of Apache gun-ships to kill our enemies and save friendly lives, you force us onto the roads. And the roads are where bombs and ambushes can further restrict our movement.

The insurgent/terrorist/militia strategy is to lock us down, to slow our responses - ultimately, to paralyze us. Our enemies not only seek to level the playing field, but to tilt it against us, practically and psychologically.

Good strategy. Can they make it work?

Not without help. Those birds appear to have been knocked down by a combination of shoulder-fired, surface-to-air missiles (SAMs) and gunfire. Gunfire's always been a threat, but aircraft are surprisingly tough to hit unless you know what you're doing. Man-pack SAMs require some basic training, but find their targets much more reliably.

Unless these shoot-downs were a weird blip, foreign powers are involved, providing the missiles and training - probably outside of Iraq. Our intel services either already know who's lurking behind our enemies' new capabilities or will confirm it soon enough.

And who might those third parties be?

Iran? You bet. Even though those claiming responsibility for the shoot-downs register as Sunni Arabs, the Iranians are perfectly willing to aid their long-term enemies to defeat us in the short term, calculating that they can deal with the Sunnis later.

If we have proof that Iran is supplying the missiles, there's no substitute for sending Tehran an exploding Valentine. But the targets chosen should be training centers near the Iraqi border or facilities otherwise associated with Tehran's subversion efforts: Make it hurt, but spare Iran's regular military and infrastructure - for now.

Why? Because we need to continue to make every reasonable effort to show the people of Iran that we don't regard them as our enemies, only the regime that they themselves despise. Hit the guilty, not their victims.

...

This latter suggestion is a messenger strategy and they have a poor history when combat is involved. Think of Vietnam bombing campaigns where important targets were avoided to send a message of "resolve." Of course the real message is that you do not have the resolve to take effective action. Then there are the Russians who are the likely source for the technology that is being used to shoot the choppers. They have personal experience with how effective such a strategy can be based on their experience in Afghanistan. I would rely more on A-10's for attack aircraft in supporting troops under fire. It is a more effective weapon and is much tougher to bring down.